


give me some rope, tie me to dream

by erce3



Category: Community (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Episode: s03e07 Studies In Modern Movement, M/M, Missing Scene, Mutual Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-01
Updated: 2020-07-01
Packaged: 2021-03-05 03:41:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,716
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25007878
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/erce3/pseuds/erce3
Summary: It’s a lot trickier than either of them anticipated, taping Troy to Annie’s bathroom door.*aka, there's no stool in annie's bathroom, so abed would have had to hold troy up to tape him against the door
Relationships: Troy Barnes/Abed Nadir
Comments: 16
Kudos: 249





	give me some rope, tie me to dream

It’s a lot trickier than either of them anticipated, taping Troy to Annie’s bathroom door. Or ex-bathroom door. Troy’s not sure. But ‘ex-bathroom door’ implies that it’s no longer a bathroom door, ‘cause it is, it’s just not Annie’s anymore. Because Annie shares bathroom doors with them now. Which is awesome, but not relevant.

Anyways. He whispers the idea to Abed, and Abed’s head tilts as he calculates. He holds up his pointer finger, saying, “It’ll be hard to execute,” and Troy nods.

“Eggs are cute,” agrees Troy, patting Abed as he places one of Annie’s old textbooks into a box. He doesn’t know why she has kept them. Troy always sells his books—maybe if Annie sold hers, she wouldn’t be so broke. He decides he’ll bring it up to her. Abed knows the best way to sell them, too.

Either way, Abed thinks for a while, and then lays out the plan: first, the nature of the bit requires them to be in the bathroom for long stretches of time with no suspicion. Two, they need to steal the tape. Three, they need to tape Troy to the door.

When Annie and Britta are whispering to each other, Troy’s first step is to grab the tape. He uses it to tape up some boxes, but then hides it from their line of sight at the right moment.

The next step Abed takes. He says, “Annie, where’s your toolkit? Your sink is leaky and Troy could fix that.”

“Really?” says Annie, looking up. She quirks her head, then walks over to near her bed and grabs a red toolkit. Troy’s impressed she even has a toolkit, because they don’t, but then again, Annie is probably prepared for anything. “That  _ would _ mean I’d get my security deposit back... Thanks, you guys!” she says, beaming, and hands it to Abed.

Abed motions for Troy to meet him in the bathroom.

Troy does, subtly passing the tape to Abed as they walk over.

(He also fixes the sink before they tape him to the door.)

That part isn't the problem. It’s the  _ taping _ that becomes the issue. 

It turns out: Annie doesn’t have a stool. And for the effect, Troy has to be floating. Or rather, Troy’s planning to make  _ Abed _ float, but since someone needs to be off the ground, and Abed is stronger than he is, they decide he’s better to be taped to the door. Because Abed needs to hold him there and tape him down at the same time.

That’s the conclusion they come to, anyway, when Troy stares at the wall and says, “You can’t fly.”

“I can hold you up against the door,” says Abed. It’s more of a statement than an offer.

Troy grins, and they do their handshake as an agreement, and once their arms drop, Abed takes him by the shoulders and lifts him so that he’s pressed against the closed door.

Which is—well. Troy’s having a lot of feelings about Abed pinning him against the door with both hands. He watches as Abed holds him there, arms straining with the weight of Troy’s body, slightly sweaty, and Troy thinks about how he has to tape down his waist until he’s stuck enough that Abed can get down his arms.

That’s the plan, anyway. But it’s— _ distracting. _ Abed’s made of sticks and noodle-like limbs, sure, but he’s  _ strong. _ He’s completely steady, even with slightly labored breathing as he looks intensely at Troy with his gentle and mysterious eyes, and Troy kind of forgets how to tape himself down.

He fumbles with the tape in the space between them, struggling not to move his arms too much but unable to pull out enough tape without moving his shoulders and lifting his arms up to stick enough tape to the door.   
  
Abed frowns, seeing this, and then sets him down. He’s about to complain, when Abed picks him up again, this time his arms around Troy’s chest, which is—which is—

“Thanks,” he manages.

He’s vaguely aware of his own breathing. Abed’s panting, too. “Come on, Troy,” says Abed gently, and he nods. “Logistically speaking, I can’t hold you like this forever.”

Troy nods again, and begins to tape himself to the door. It’s kind of slow work, and he can tell Abed’s getting tired, because even though there’s enough space between them for Troy to do it, Abed’s head keeps gravitating towards his own. He’s still bowed in a way that Troy has room for his hands, but his torso is curving so that Abed can rest his head against Troy’s, which is—

Just as Abed’s head hits Troy’s, a gentle bump, Troy curses and ends up fumbling the tape.

“Crap,” he says, as it tumbles from his hands, and at the sound of his voice, Abed’s body snaps against his so that they’re pressed together and can catch it. It ends up lodged in between their stomachs, where Troy can reach it if he just moves his hand towards it, but suddenly he’s hyper aware of Abed’s chest pressed against his own, the way Abed shifts his head so that Troy can breathe, which just means that Troy can hear Abed panting against his ear, since he  _ knows _ it’s a lot of strain to be holding Troy up.

He needs to just grab it. He can feel Abed’s chest rise and fall against his. He’s pretty sure Abed’s got one leg wedged between his two. He closes his eyes. “Thanks,” he whispers instead. His fingers rap against Abed’s waist and he considers how to best get the tape lodged between them.

“Troy,” says Abed in his ear, winded.

Troy exhales shakily and nods. “Sorry,” he says, and moves his arms away from Abed’s waist, and instead shoves his right hand in between their tightly pressed bodies to grab the tape. “Got it.”

“Cool. Cool cool cool,” says Abed, unpeeling his body from Troy’s.

All of Troy’s nerves are still tingling from the contact as Abed moves his head again, pinning Troy against the door as Troy continues, a little robotically, to tape himself down. “This is gonna take a while, huh,” says Troy softly, and Abed nods, staring at him and also, like, past him? Like his eyes have unfocused?

Troy hisses, and tries to focus on taping himself down a little faster. It’s hard, because Abed’s eyes have kind of landed on his biceps, and he can’t really see down, so all he’s doing is looking at Abed’s face as he tears off long strips of tape from his torso to stick himself against the door. 

Abed’s face is doing all these complicated things, and his jaw has kind of clenched in a weird way, like the way Jeff sometimes looked at Britta a couple years ago, but Troy figures Abed’s just trying to focus on keeping him upright.

The fact that Abed’s strong enough to keep him upright like this for this long is also—

Troy tries not to think about it, or else his brain will start crying.

Sometimes, Abed’s face flicks up to Troy’s, and he looks kind of at this spot on Troy’s chin, where Troy worries there might be food from their late lunch, or maybe Troy’s lower lip. Then Abed’s jaw clenches tighter, and he goes back to looking at Troy’s biceps, which makes Troy’s heart do all sorts of weird things, because—

That’s what best friends are like, right? And Abed’s the  _ best _ best friend to have, because they can do cool stuff like this, like taping Troy to Annie’s ex-bathroom door.

They don’t really talk as Troy continues to pull out long strips of tape, mostly because Abed’s concentrating and Troy’s kind of winded and his brain goes kind of fuzzy every time he thinks about the fact that Abed is  _ pinning him to a door, _ and then Troy forgets words and how to string them together and stuff.

So he just focuses on taping and looking past Abed’s face to the little picture of the beach Annie hung in the bathroom.

Eventually, Troy manages to tape himself down enough that Abed can relax and pin him with one hand to keep him up, and tape with the other. He sees Abed exhale shakily, probably from the exertion, and he sighs, too, from the loss of contact. “Nice,” mouths Abed to himself, as he finishes up Troy’s taping job. 

“Annie’s reaction is gonna be awesome,” says Troy, and then feels weird about bringing up Annie. Abed is taping him down mechanically the whole time. There’s a nice rhythm to it. It’d make a good beat to a rap, thinks Troy aimlessly, watching as Abed keeps a hand steady against Troy’s chest.

Abed’s hands, usually cool, are warm against his sternum.

“Yeah,” says Abed, looking distracted. He keeps looking at Troy’s mouth. Maybe Troy has stuff in his teeth, not food on his chin. But Abed would tell him, right? 

“Yeah,” agrees Troy, both relieved and disappointed that Abed had to stop holding him with both hands. He’s wrapped pretty tight in tape, but weirdly he feels cold and kind of misses Abed holding him up? Maybe when they get him down he’ll give Abed a hug later.

  
That’ll solve things.

“Yeah,” repeats Abed, nodding to himself. He lets go tentatively of Troy’s chest, like he didn’t want to, and Troy frowns a little bit as Abed covers the spot where his hand was with tape. That spot is also cold. Troy is struck with the sudden urge to reach out and grab Abed’s hand, but he can’t, because his hands have been taped down.

He flexes his fingers under the tape, and focuses on the beach painting instead of the thought of Abed’s hands. 

The rhythmic noise of the tape being ripped and placed fills the silence. “That would be a cool beat to a rap,” says Troy eventually. “You could beatbox over it.”

Abed cocks his head, considering, and gives Troy a half smile. He nods, and begins to beatbox as he continues to tape him down.

Troy closes his eyes, clears his head of thoughts of Abed holding him up, of Abed’s hands, of Abed looking at his lips and biceps—

And he begins to softly freestyle.

**Author's Note:**

> k posted in the discord that logically abed wldve had to hold troy up bc annie doesnt have a stool so i went feral im so sorry lmao. this is not edited at all im sorry that being said i’m figbian on tungle/twit
> 
> update: i wrote some more of this Concept [here](https://figbian.tumblr.com/post/622422300977971200/a-little-sequel-like-thing-to-give-me-some-rope)


End file.
